Friday, July 12, 2013

yesterday

Yesterday

The Belted Galloway is a heritage beef breed of cattle originating from Galloway in Scotland, adapted to living on the poor upland pastures and windswept moorlands
of the region. It is the belt that gives them their name. Belted Galloways are primarily raised for their quality marbled beef,
although they are sometimes milked and purchased to adorn pastures due
to their striking appearance.Galloway cattle are naturally polled (no horns).
The most visible characteristics of the Belted Galloway are its long
hair coat and the broad white belt that completely encircles the body.
Its coarse outer coat helps shed the rain, and its soft undercoat
provides insulation and waterproofing, enabling the breed to happily
overwinter outside. Belties are well-suited for rough grazing land and will utilize coarse
grasses other breeds would shun. They are able to maintain good
condition on less than ideal pasture,
and produce a high quality beef product on grass alone. The USDA Cycle
IV Germ Plasm Evaluation Program at the Meat Animal Research Center
(MARC) showed that Galloway crosses placed at the top of the chart for
flavor, juiciness and tenderness when compared to eleven other breeds.

color shown here is dun and black

Around 1800 the Daniel Barrett family began farming much of the
property that’s now Aldermere Farm. Like other coastal Maine farmers at
the time, the Barretts raised sheep and a variety of other animals, as
well as fruit and vegetables for local markets. In 1899 Albert
Chatfield, Sr. and his wife Helen, from Cincinnati, purchased the
Barrett property for their family’s summer home.

Albert Chatfield, Jr. inherited the farm from his father in 1950
and took up residence there with his wife Marion. The couple began
methodically studying progressive scientific agriculture, intending to
revitalize the somewhat neglected land. Their research extended to beef cattle, and they sought to identify
the most suitable breed for Aldermere’s rough terrain and cool, damp
weather. They settled on the Belted Galloways of Scotland, a hardy,
highly adaptable breed which thrives in rugged environments with severe
weather conditions.In 1953 Mr. Chatfield started the Aldermere Beltie herd by
purchasing a bull and six cows, establishing what is now the oldest
continuously-operated herd of Belted Galloway cattle in the United
States. With the help of his right hand man, Dwight Howard, Mr.
Chatfield built up the herd until Aldermere Farm became a household name
among Beltie breeders. Aldermere stock have been awarded the highest
level of recognition of any farm over the last 30 years.

beautiful homes in Maine

LEO (let's eat out) to the Lobster Pound last night.

Here is the guard of the placeThis is where you order. They then place lobster, clams, mussels, shrimp and the like in a bag with a number tag on it and throw it in the boiling water. You are given the number on your bag and told to wait 15 to 20 minutes until they call you. When called you go pay and bring it out to enjoy.

I showed these on another blog, these are the tanks where they keep the catch of the day fresh. We walked past these on our way out to the picnic tables to eat.

Part of the group

Another part of the group

Still more peeps

This is my dinner. I just love lobster

This is Rog's meal. He is not all that great a fan of lobster. Well he likes it but he thinks its a bit pricey. I on the other hand just love lobster. LOL I was thinking he should have had a hot dog because he loves those, but he decided on a halibut dinner instead.

Roy and Ruth are having what they call a bucket. This is a meal for two. They get lobster, clams, mussels, oyster on the half shell, shrimp, and corn on the cob.

Mike and Liz are planning their attack on their bucket. You can see above their heads the pipes that bring in the water for the blue tanks inside the building to keep those shell fish happy and healthy, well healthy anyway.

Friends

This is our little group minus two that stayed back at camp to BBQ steaks. But these are all of the Alaska reunion peeps.

Today

Today we split and did our own things, some went on a fishing boat and fished no catching this time, some went on more sight seeing trips, some shopped, some stayed home and worked and kayaked. I stayed home did some work around the place and then went kayaking with Terri. We had Don over for dinner to try some of the Belted beef we purchased yesterday. Not all that great really, but I can now say I tried some. In the evening we all got together to enjoy a fire and visit. This is our "leader", he hates that, he is the man. He got all of us organized to come here, he picked the campground out and had a great list of places to go and things to do ready to hand out when we got here. Dave and Judy were great hosts!!!!

Thank you!!!

The lady in the middle is Ruth, our resident Canadian. She got a card and has just presented it to our hosts.

We are off to start our new adventure to Canada tomorrow. I am so excited and so ready to begin. We will be in the states two more days. Then I will unplug phone and wifi. That means for my blogger readers I will only be able to blog unless the campgrounds we visit has wifi. So you may not hear from me for some time, or maybe not I don't know how it will all work out. All I can say is stay tuned, drop in every so often and see if I was able to post.